Formerly the Children S Center for Self-Esteem

1

The ARK GROUP

(Formerly The Children’s Center for Self-Esteem)

ARK (Adults Relating to Kids) Programs

ARK Program Report

Year Ended, 2006

Dear Mark,

Our thanks from the twenty-eight member Advisoryand ten-member Operating Boardsand the Staff of The ARKGroup, for your friendship and wonderful advocacy, counsel and support of ourARK programs. We so greatly appreciate you for all that you have done and want to provide a re-cap of the progress we have experienced in the year just ended 2006.

The ARK (Adults Relating to Kids) Program hasbeen able to grow its capacity for service because of last year’s support fromyou. The supportyou have provided has been crucial to our viability and has allowed us to make a tremendous difference in the lives of thousands of children, parents, teachers and other adult care-givers who are dealing with the challenges of enhancing the qualities of life for their children and students by reducing violence, truancy, and drop-out rates and improving high school graduation rates today in America. We believe that we can change history -- one child, one family, one teacher, one classroom, one community and one city at a time -- and are excited about sharing news of our 2006 achievements and future plans with you.

In particular, I want to share with you what your support of our organization has enabled us to accomplish in our effort to serve children and to support the families, teachers and other significant community members who are involved in their care. .

One of the major accomplishments was the anchoring and firming of our process to examine annually our strategic and tactical plans. This annual process helps usto identify key directions we wantto pursue in order to grow our organization and reach more kids. Our 2006 exercise continued to identify areas where we needed to improve. These areas of improvement included an organization staffing training and goal-setting and measurement process, the establishment of a Development Board Committee in our Dallas offices, expanded efforts to network with other community organizations who are pursuing similar missions, expanding our curriculum offerings, and broadening our communications. We have added these items to our work processes, outlined a plan to address each of these areas over the next five- year period, and have accomplished the following in 2006:

♦Successfully completed our revised staffing and assessment cycle which provided a process approach to staff appraisals, contributions and areas for improvements and a feedback loop for accessing improvements in performance.

♦Through our centered focus on the ARK for Teachers Program as the foundation program for impacting the greatest number of children, the ARKGroup expanded the number of institutions utilizing the Program in the Dallas and Houston communities.

♦Continued to update our managementpolicies adding a Conflict of Interest, Business Practices and an Ethics Policy to ensure a more effective organization.The new policies and practices were approved by the Boards. Our Advisory Boardconsists of 28 prominent leaders in Dallas, Houston and London.The Advisory Board meets twice a year. The Operating Board is made up of ten members and meets quarterly.

♦Sought out and developed collaborations with like-minded organizations in an effort to expand our reach in delivering unconditional care and advocacy to children and youth.We continue to work with ourprior year collaboratives including joint programming with the following: After School AllStars, Girl Scouts of America, Boys and Girls Country, Texas Youth Mentoring Foundation, ProjectGRAD (National Office and programs operating in Houston) Communities in Schools, Neighborhood Centers, Inc., Star of Hope, Juveniles Ready for Work Services, Voice of Hope, Care Net Pregnancy Centers Inc., The Wilkerson Center, the Southern Methodist University golf team,Back2Basics Basketball and the North Texas PGA professionals. In 2006, we joined efforts with the Houston YMCA to develop an After-School program for Middle Schools. The program was piloted in four schools in the Spring and Klein ISDs. In addition, we have joined with numerous Early Learning and Pre-School programs in Texas to provide new ARK toolsets to teachers in those public and private institutions.

♦Proactively developed new curriculum which was added to materials used in public and private schools, churches, community centers, Texas State Jails, United Way Agencies, Neighborhood Centers andfour new juvenile justice systems in Harris and MontgomeryCounties.

♦Developed new ARK training DVD’s including new DVD’s for ARK Facilitator Training and a new DVD which teaches the ARG Group Process.

♦Developed a new delivery format for our e-newsletter and enhanced our website located at thearkgroup.org.

We have completed the rollout for our new course content of the ARK for Parent Course I programs in English and Spanish, secular and faith-based--along with the accompanying Facilitator Guides. We have introduced our new ARK for Teachers materials with content specific to Early-LearningPre-School, Elementary School and Middle / High School curriculums. In addition, we have revised curriculums for our ARK for College Kids, ARK for Teens and ARK for Kidsprograms. We were very fortunate to have nationally known cartoonists and humorists provide materials for these new publications. These expanded offerings have greatly improvedthe content quality and readability of the ARKbooks, manuals, workbooks and materials. We are very appreciative to the Hugworks Organization for their contribution of a new CD of kid’s music. These songs and instrumentals have been incorporated into our ARK for Kids programs with enthusiastic success.

One of our most challenging developments has been the continued expansion of our School programs in the Houston, Dallas, Spring, Aldine, Alief, FortBend, Irving, Galveston, the Hurst/Euless/Bedford, Carroll, Mansfield, Grand Prairie and AzleIndependentSchool Districts and three State Chartered schools in HarrisCounty.

• In Houston ISD, we have formed a collaborative with Communities in Schools--working with their staff supporting 65 schools.We completed training of facilitators for our ARK for Teacher programs for13 new schools.In 2004-2006, we implemented ARK in the Central Region of HISD. This coming spring, we are thrilled to have been asked to develop a program to expand the ARK programs to the entire District, following the process used in the IrvingSchool District. This Collaborative will include the management of HISD, Communities in Schools, Parents in Education and The ARKGROUP.
• In Aldine ISD, we are working plans to expand our programs from the Early Childhood and Pre Kindergarten Head Start Schools into the 12 CIS supported schools which include elementary, middle, ninth grade centers and high schools.
• In Cy Fair ISD, the third largest school district in the State, we are working the opportunity for programs, specifically in schools with ESL (English as the second language) challenges--which will use some of the same methodologies developed in our existing Aldine ISD programsin Houston.
• In Spring ISD, work continues with the Consolidated 9th grade campus and we are making plans to implement ARK for Teachers with their staff of approximately 111.
• In Alief ISD, we initially understand that we will be working with 12 CIS schools
• In Fort Bend ISD, one school is anticipated to join the program along with three State Charted schools in HarrisCounty.
• In Hurst-Euless-Bedford ISD, we have continued to grow theARK for Teens in TrinityHigh School which incorporates the program into Trojan Talks twice a month--facilitated by a Homeroom Teacher and an outside mentor. Additionally, we kicked off an ARK for Teachers program at KeysHigh School and the FEWAlternative School. Principals Nate Hearne and Linda Reeves have been extremely pleased with the program and the many positive outcomes from their staff. Nate has assisted The ARKGroup by contributing his expertise and participation to the new lesson materials used in the ARK Teacher DVDs.
• In Dallas ISD, our premier program in the Pleasant Grove area of DISD is operating in 11 elementary and middle schools in collaboration with Texas Youth Mentoring and the Sarano Kelley Program for Teachers.
• In Irving ISD twenty-two schools have completed facilitator training sessions and have implemented the ARK for Teachers curriculum. They have indicated their 2007 goal is to have Irving ISD recognized as a total “ARKSchool District”.
• Greater Dallas formed a collaborative with Mi Escuelita Preschools, Childcare Group, Head Start of Greater Dallas, and Communities in Schools (Dallas) to implement the ARK for Teachers Program with their Pre-School and Early Learning Centers (66 sites over the next three years).. We have high expectations that this program for pre-school kids will become a standard for other cities
• Dallas-Fort Worth early stage planning initiatives include expansions into Carroll ISDs’ Middle Schools, Grand Prairie ISD, Fort Worth ISD, Munford ISD, Azle ISD and a number of additional early learning centers in DallasCounty.

We have received excellent reviews from Irving ISD Area Teachers, staff and the Principals at the twenty-two schools as to changes not only in student behavior, but in the parent and community involvement and test scores.This program has provided education to XXfamilies, XXX children, and XXX Teachers.

The Pleasant Grove programalso provided the children of the parents who participated in ARK for Parents an after School Golf program which was assisted by the SMU golf team and the North Texas PGA professionals, and the children after school offering was expanded to include Back2Basics Basketball.

• We are operatingARK for Parent programs in 5 of the 17 Texas State Jails. Our work at Plane State Women’s Jail added two new programs for two entire Dormitories at the Warden’s request. Because of past year’s success in reducing recidivism and improving the self-concepts of the women parents who have taken the program, this major expansion has enabled an 150 additional women each semester to participate in ARK for Parents. Our research with the State Jails indicates a substantial (16 point improvement on a 0-100 scale) in the self-concept of the mothers and fathers enrolled in the programs. In 2004–2006, over 700 parents completed that program.

• Our Juvenile Justice programs in Houston/Harris County graduated over 280 families in each of the 2003, 2004 and 2005 periods. In 2006, over one thousand parents and their teens completed ARK for parents and ARK for Teens. We have begun January with another record referral from the Juvenile Courts and the Texas and Harris County Child Protective Services Departments with ARK for Parents and ARK for Teens being offered in Harris and Montgomery Counties with over 250enrolled to attend our first of seven planned sessions in 2007.ARK programshave been shown to turn around disappointing graduation rates andto decreaserecidivism in the juvenile courts.

Because of our successful growth in HarrisCounty, we were invited to add programs in Conroe, Willis, Montgomery, New Caney, and Magnolia,Texas. Two sessions were completed in these new locations in late 2006 and are being supported by four new countyJustices of the Peace. We are thankful for these five new challenges and have great hopes that ARK programs will not only reduce the teens’ return to the court system, but will enrich the lives of those families for generations to come.

• We have been thrilled with the ARK for Teachers programs usage by the University of Houston,Collegeof Education as a required curriculum for graduating teachers in 2005 and 2006. Dr Nita Copely believes the way we relate to children in the classroom is at least as important, if not more so, than the content of what we teach them. She has been instrumental in adding ARK for Teachers programs to the University environment.

• New areas you might be interested in knowing that ARK programs have been introduced and have been operating in 2006.

Tomball Promise – Program sponsored by the Tomball Chamber of Commerce that seeks to grow leadership skills and self-concepts in kids.

UgandaMission – Program offering hope, medicine, food and education, including ARK for Parents, to the remote populations of young parents in Bulabakulu, Uganda.

Peace (Parents and Educators Advocating Child Enrichment) Project in Klein and Spring ISD. – Program offering after-school programs for Middle Schoolers. The ARKGroup collaborated with Spring and Klein ISDs, local churches and the YMCA to start after-school mentoring, tutoring, and 6 new fun activities per semester at 4 middle schools. ARK programs in Action is helping to put in place Oversight Committees composed of Teachers, Parents and local interested volunteers to steward the activities. ARK materials enrich the program.

Northwest Assistance Ministries (NAM) – ARK for Parents and ARK for Teens and Children programs are being offered at no cost to economically-depressed families who are securing new starts at NAM.

Juvenile Read 4 Work – Program to provide guidance and adult support to kids just released from Juvenile programs in North Houston. ARK for Parents materials are used to educate staff and parents in helping promote these young people’s new beginnings.

St. Paul’s de Vincent’s TransitionalLivingCenter – ARK for Parents materials are bemg used as a means of establishing hope, faith and fresh starts.

Star of Hope – ARK for Parents are used exclusively for adult parent education along with a course in financial management and job search skills.

HoustonCanAcademy, Mom Society Programs, Houston School of Morals and Ethics, Mi Escuelia Preschools, Childcare Group, Head Start of Greater Dallas, and Hope Literacy – employ ARK programs and processes for individuals and families as vehicles for growth and change.

• ball Prom

Our vision is to change history one child, one family, one teacher, one classroomat a time. Through ARK, we will offer the opportunity for significant change in student academic and behavioral growth, training and staff development, and parent and community involvement. We also want to impact the school-wide climate with multi-level objectives of accountability, and unconditional care and advocacy for the physical, intellectual, social and emotional development of children. We continue to measure these changes using the research methodology and processes of Professors and Doctorial candidates at the University of North Texas and Texas A&M Prairie View. Qualitatively, we received strong responses from all our past year participants.

The ARKGroup has elected not only to continue the growth of existing areas, but also to expand our capacity in other areas. We know that in order to reach not just thousands but hundreds of thousands of children, parents, teachers and other caring adults, we must deliver projects which will get into the hands of more neighborhood centers, community centers, school districts, state jails, juvenile justice systems, churches, education professionals and concerned adults. We want to provide educational tools for thosewho want to participate in the free enterprise system of our global economies and who wish to serve the futures of larger numbers of children by enabling them to graduate from high school and to become members of a productive and educated citizenship made possible by the advocacy of caring and nurturing adults.

While we are in process of getting participating schools to contribute to the cost of ARK programming on their campuses, we do not currently have a sufficient stream of income to cover all of our costs for our services to schools. This presents a significant challenge for our organization. We must rely on the generosity of donors and foundations, and in particular your help for our viability and for the growth of our capacity to serve more and more children in the school districts we serve.

Our current goal is to raise $528,000, a 48% growth over prior year,for our school projects in Dallas and Houston areas for the 2007-2008schoolyears and for an expanded ARK for Parents and ARK for Teens program in churches and community centers located in lower socio-economic locations. These funds will secure an adequate cashflow position for The ARK Programs in support of our direct service with children and help to move our expansion plans forward so that the children and their parents and teachers will have their lives enriched by the provision of nurturing classroom and homeenvironments.

We know that you would agree that graduation and dropout rates are unacceptable in the public school systems in Texas. In both Dallas and Houston, some studies show that there is a 60% dropout of high school students after they enter the ninth grade. It is equally disturbing that the school dropout rate has risen 10% in the last eight years. MindOH reports that, if a student has one adult at school that truly cares for him, the chances of that student’s dropping out of school are reduced by 97%. ARK for Teachers provides the climate of nurture that will keep children in school.